Ilyana Alexandrovna — Russian Federation

Interviewer: Yekaterina Tsiolkova, Russian Federation.

Interviewee: Ilyana Alexandronva, Russian Federation

Yekaterina: Ilyana, how old were you when transition came to Russia?

Iliana: I was eleven. It was a week after my eleventh birthday.

Yekaterina: That must have been an exciting week! Did transition have any effect on your birthday?

Ilyana: Yes! It was my happiest birthday!

Yekaterina: How so?

Ilyana: As long as I could remember, my parents were always worried and tired. I hardly ever saw them smile or laugh.

We almost never had quite enough to eat. We huddled around a wood stove my father made for warmth during outages off and on all winter. Our clothes and shoes were falling apart. My mother and father were always saying we didn’t have enough money. They were not home a lot because of working so much. But it was never enough. I knew they loved me, but birthdays were always bittersweet. They would take me skating on the river if it was still frozen until I outgrew my skates, or I would get some fresh fruit or maybe a new blouse, and I was grateful and appreciated my gifts and the love behind them, but my whole life felt like it revolved around not enough of everything.

On my birthday a week after the transition, it was different. Mostly it was the feeling. It was like all my life there were dark clouds and rain, and then suddenly the sun came out and rose for the first time. It was like the longest, most beautiful sunrise ever!

My mother and father were smiling and laughing more than I’d ever seen. There was enough food on the table, fresh food, good food. My parents were home a lot more in that week after transition. They were more relaxed and playful for the first time. On my birthday we had a chocolate cake, and I got a whole new beautiful outfit, even new shoes! And a balalaika like I’d always wanted to play but there was never money for it, and a laptop computer loaded with so much music! My parents told me that the shortages we’d always had weren’t real, that the oligarchs in the government and big businesses had caused it. Things were there but never got to where people could get them. I was too young to understand what that meant. All I knew was that it was like someone had turned on a light switch in my life.

Yekaterina: Can you share some about what you remember about life before the transition?

Ilyana: I’ll try. Most of the time I don’t like to think about those times, but I agree with your wanting to make sure people will always remember so we never go back to that.

That Russia was the only place and the only life I’d ever known, so it was normal to me. I thought that was just life. I thought it was like that everywhere.

I had two older brothers: Fyodor and Boris, and one younger sister, Olga. When I was six, Boris was drafted to go fight in that endless war in Ukraine. I wish I could remember him better. He was always the one who could make us all laugh. And I remember he always kept me safe. I always felt safe when he was with me.

But he never came home from the war. We could never find out anything more than he was killed in action. But they never brought his body home. We had a funeral without him. The government didn’t care about things like that. I was eight. He was in the war for almost two years. My parents grieved him for a long time. My mother would cry herself to sleep, and my father would curse the government and the stupid war, and my mom would tell him to be more quiet so neighbors wouldn’t hear him and turn him in.

Fyodor wasn’t as outgoing as Boris. He would listen to music for hours and wrote a lot of songs. He ran away when the time came for him to be drafted. One day he just packed a few things and said he had to go and that he wouldn’t follow Boris to the grave just for nothing. He didn’t say where he was going, but later we started getting letters and emails from him, and messages on Telegram, saying he is doing well and missing us, but he can’t come home. He wouldn’t say where he was, only that he was safe and happy.

Later we learned that he had found a new home in Poland. Since transition, he’s come to visit us a few times and I’ve gone to see him in Warsaw. He’s doing well. He plays in the Warsaw Symphony Orchestra and he’s also in a band called Novaya Synergie. We’ve become close and of course when we see each other we jam a lot.

My sister Olga was born when I was was four. She shared my bedroom. She cried a lot at first but later she was curious about everything. When she learned to talk, she was always asking “what” and “why” and “how.” I felt like I needed to protect her because she was always getting into things that could hurt her.

My father was a civil engineer, but sometimes he wouldn’t get paid, so he also worked a lot of extra hours doing whatever he could get paid for.

He couldn’t complain too much to his boss because he might get fired. This was not unusual in Russia at the time. He would get up early and come home late, then he would eat and fall asleep. The only times he didn’t work was when there wasn’t any work. On those days he was worried, but I was happy. He was a good father. He still is. I was so happy that he wasn’t drunk and mean like some of my friends’ fathers. He got impatient sometimes but never mean and he almost never drank.

My mother worked as a salesperson in a department store, also long hours like my father. She always complained that her feet hurt because she couldn’t sit down at work. She also worked another job that I wasn’t supposed to talk about. I’ve learned since then that she worked in the black market delivering illegal things to clients and bringing cash back to her bosses there. This was very dangerous, but most people were in the same situation. We did what we had to do to keep going.

When I was eight I started collecting metal and glass to sell for a few kopecks because I felt sad for my parents. It wasn’t much but I felt like it was important. I felt like a grown-up.

Even when there was money, most times there weren’t the things we needed, or they cost too much. If you had protektsia, if you had connections to the right people, you could get things, but we didn’t have that. We didn’t starve and there were a lot of people who had it worse than we did, but we were almost always a little hungry and never really had enough of anything.

I liked school. I made friends pretty quickly and I liked to learn how to do things. I had a group of friends. We did everything together and we played together after school.

My best friend was Katya Kuznetskaya, and she still is. Her father used to drink a lot and beat her and her brother and mother, so she spent a lot of time at our apartment. We stood up for each other many times when older bully kids picked on one of us. We got a reputation of don’t mess with those girls or they’ll make you regret it.

I loved music and really wanted to learn to play balalaika. I found an old record player which Fyodor got to work and slowly collected some old records to listen to. But my parents could not buy an instrument for me to play.

I wasn’t unhappy. I don’t want you to think my life was bad. It was just that there wasn’t a lot of joy. There was always worry and stress. We were always having to be careful what we said to whom. We were cold all winter because there were a lot of outages everywhere. My mother and father were always tired. They rarely had time to play with us or do fun things as a family. They never encouraged us kids to dream and go after it, because that just wasn’t real to them. They mostly taught us survival skills and family loyalty. But we kids did play, and sometimes we got into trouble a little being curious and pushing things. Nothing serious. We felt like these were great adventure.

One time Katya and I tried to sneak into a movie theater and got caught. I guess you could say my childhood before transition was a little bit like what they say Seattle is like in America: always cloudy and raining a lot.

Yekaterina: So, what was it like in the times just before transition? As a child, did you notice anything changing in the adults around you? In your parents? At school?

Ilyana: Yes. Yes, we did.

Yekaterina: Can you tell me about it?

Iliana: About a year before transition, my parents started spending time reading something on their cell phones and talking excitedly. They started to have friends of theirs over to join them.

When I asked them what it was about, they said they had joined a book club and they were reading a really good book. When I asked if I could read it, they said it was a book for grownups and a child wouldn’t understand, that it would be boring to me.

Grownups were always saying things like that. A few times I snuck a look and saw the title was “The Cure” something but then my mother came back from the kitchen so I couldn’t see more. I tried to listen to their talk after I pretended to go to sleep. I couldn’t hear much, but I did manage to catch a lot of expressions like “Yes, that explains it!” and “Och! I never knew that!” and “Yes, that’s what we need!” but also “Is this possible? Can we possibly succeed?”

My parents’ mood seemed to get a little better as time went on. At school I also noticed little changes. A lot of my friends also said their parents were reading something and getting excited. My Mathematics teacher and my Language Arts teacher both seemed to get more energy, like they felt more alive.

As that year or so went on, when there were blackouts, some of the teachers would say that things will get better soon, instead of the cynical, ironic comments they always had made. Instead of “Here we go again, teaching in the dark. Oh well, no biggie, as long as their dachas have power, and their yachts have plenty of caviar…” (we all know who ‘they’ were.) we began to hear “Don’t worry! This sh*t won’t go on much longer.”

One day my parents suddenly had new phones that they were trying to learn how to use, but they never used them and told us not to tell anyone about them. This seemed very strange.

I also overheard things. Once in the school library, I heard Mr. Simonov asking the librarian Ms. Bayul why they couldn’t print The Cure on a printer and make it available in the library. Her answer was an alarmed, whispered “Do you want us all to die of a ‘tragic fall’ from a tall building!?”

Sometimes in the Metro or in the supermarket I overheard people asking people “Do you have The Cure?” then saying, “This where you download it.”

This was around the time when state television and radio began broadcasting more intense warnings against attempts by “corrupt Western democracies” to destabilize our “great nation” with “seditious, malicious propaganda” over the Internet. The government called on people to turn in anyone they knew who was “acting suspiciously” or “maligning the benevolent Russian government or its persons, policies, and functionaries” or “reading or disseminating seditious literature.”

By fall, that year felt very strange and different. Everywhere there was nervous energy. A feeling of expectation, kind of like fear mixed with eager anticipation. All around, things were falling apart. The outages got worse and more often. More and more times people weren’t getting paid. The news kept announcing more “austerity measures to support our brave soldiers fighting to protect the Motherland from NATO aggression.” Every day it seemed, more people died tragic deaths from falling off of tall buildings and out of helicopters, including members of the Federal Assembly and some celebrities. There was a lot of whispering but very little talking out loud.

When we children tried to ask adults what was happening, they told us we wouldn’t understand and asked us not to ask too many questions. We wanted to know if we should be afraid and what to do. Finally one day after my sister and I and Katya, who was staying with us almost all the time by now since her father’s drinking had gotten much worse, my parents sat us down and said that yes, a lot of things were happening but that they couldn’t explain it all to us. They said everybody’s life would get a lot harder for a while but not to be afraid because things will get much better soon, probably before summer. They told us to be very careful and watchful, and to say “No” if anyone asked them if our parents were acting different, or if we had heard the word “Cure” a lot. They said to run away if we saw grownups fighting. They said we had to be patient just a little while longer.

That winter was the hardest winter I’d ever seen. It wasn’t just the cold and power outages. The police were stopping people randomly. Our house was searched several times. Yet I saw people showing more strength than I’d ever seen. It was like suddenly the difficulties weren’t getting to them like before.

As January ended, the news was full of confusion. Sometimes Russia was having great victories in Ukraine and Gruzia. Sometimes we were suffering painful setbacks due to NATO sabotage and treachery. Members of the Federal Assembly were resigning a lot, and some were dying from falling out of high windows. The news anchors kept changing, new faces replaced the ones we knew, only to be replaced a few days later.

Then on March 21 (I’ll always remember that date even if it wasn’t a national holiday), that morning my parents stopped Olga and me before we left for school and said, “Today we want you to be extra careful and watch the grownups around you. If you see any commotion, get as far away from it as you can. Listen to what your teachers tell you. You may see some strange and scary things. Don’t be afraid. Things will get scary for a while but then things will be much better.” Then they went out to work and we went off to school.

On the way to school, things looked pretty much like any day, except that I noticed that there were big trucks, bulldozers, excavators and piles of construction debris up against the walls and doors and windows of the banks. I also saw little groups of people talking excitedly here and there, but things seemed mostly normal.

In class, soon after roll call, our teacher turned on the television and told us there was going to be an important announcement and to pay close attention.

The announcer was the one who always did the morning news for the last two weeks. She looked straight at the camera, so it felt like she was looking right into my eyes. Then she spoke words and in a tone that we would have expected from a president or premier, not a newscaster.

She spoke for about three quarters of an hour, I guess. It started with “To all the people of the Russian Federation and of the world…” There was a lot. What I got from it was that everything was going to change but no one would try to interfere with the government. Money was abolished and everything would be free. No one was to ask for or offer payment for anything. Something about how the social system was destroying the good of the people and had to be changed. We all now owned our homes and cars and other things. Law and order would be upheld. Violence, looting, and rioting would not be tolerated from anyone and would be dealt with through due process. Everyone was urged to keep working normally except for certain places like banks and insurance companies, who were to close, and to begin to govern themselves as peers and ignore managers and the chain of command. She made a passionate call to treat each other with patience, compassion, and respect under all circumstances. She said this was a clean slate for everyone and guaranteed the safety of all people. She said the rich oligarchs were no longer in charge but that they need not fear. The Chief of the General Staff came on the camera and ordered all Russian forces to leave Ukraine, Crimea, and Gruzia and report to their home bases inside Russia and remain on high alert in case any country thinks this is a good moment to attack. There was a lot more but a lot of it ran together like a fog in my child mind.

When it was done, it was so quiet I could hear my own heartbeat. The teacher asked if there were any questions and started a discussion that lasted until lunch. She said that this transition started with this book called The Cure. Then it all made sense to me. Our teacher said the book was probably too hard for us to read and gave us the link to download a shorter version that would be better for us. I downloaded it right away and started reading. So did all of my classmates. It was the best discussion we had ever had in school.

Later we did study the long version of The Cure in history class. Our teacher was right, it was hard for a child to read, but not boring.

After lunch we were all in a holiday mood and didn’t want to study, but the teachers all said transition isn’t a reason to go crazy, and that classes would continue like always.

Right after the announcement on the television, the principal came storming into the classroom all red and mad and told our teacher that this was going to stop and the chain of command would be respected. Several other teachers came in behind him. They and my teacher told the principal very calmly, “Mr. Aharonshvili, you are no longer in charge. We mean you no disrespect, but we’re working under different rules now. We will not obey you or respect your position, but we hope you’ll stay as a valued member of the team.” He tried to shove or hit several teachers but it didn’t turn into a brawl. The teachers stayed calm and ducked out of the way. Then they held him by is arms and carried him outside and asked him to please not be violent in front of students. He said something like “We’ll see about this!” then pulled out his cell phone. He called his bosses and and got even more mad than before. We could hear everything he said because he was shouting. It sounded like his bosses told him to deal deal with the situation on his own. Then he called the police. While we waited, we continued our discussion and our teacher told us that this kind of situation will happen and that the way the teachers were dealing with it was the correct way, not to submit but not to get violent or angry and always to act and speak with respect for the other person even when they weren’t respectful.

It took a while for the police to come. The principal told them in a loud voice to make the teachers accept his authority or take them to jail. The teachers asked the police if they understood the transition that was happening. Two of the three officers said yes they understood and would support the transition. The third officer said this was the first time he had heard of it and he thought it might be treason, but in the end all three officers agreed that the teachers weren’t committing any crime so they should go on with classes. By then there was quite a crowd of teachers and students. The principal started to yell at the officers. He told them they had to make the teachers obey him. The officers tried to calm him down and he went a little crazy and started trying to hit our teacher. In the end the officers arrested the principal. The teachers asked them to be gentle with him and declined to press charges. The whole thing affected me deeply. I didn’t completely understand what had happened but I was impressed by the restraint and quiet strength that the teachers showed in response to the principal’s aggressive actions and words.

A little over a week later the principal was back at school and began teaching language arts and science classes. He seemed to adjust to the new situation day by day.

My parents came to meet Olga and me at school and accompany us home. As we walked, and it was a long walk, they asked about our day and answered more of our questions. I was happily surprised to see them get off of work so early. They said today was special and they wanted to make sure we were safe. They also said that from now on, they’ll be able to be home a lot more and not have to work such long hours.

When we passed a pastry shop on the way home, I asked my mother if everything was really going to be free from now on, and she said yes, but that doesn’t mean we can go crazy and take too much of everything. I asked if we could go in and get some free cookies. My mother and father looked at each other and smiled. “Yes, of course!” So we went in. My parents each had a piece of cake, while Olga and I each ate too many cookies. The person behind the counter smiled and laughed and said they’d been getting a lot of hungry kids that day. Then we left and thanked her, and she waved to us and smiled. No one had said or done anything with money. So it was true.

When we got home, the landlord was in the entrance arguing with some of our neighbors. My parents told us to go play but not go far, then they joined the conversation.

Of course we were too curious to go play so we hid out of sight and listened. It was a lot like the situation at school with the principal and the teachers. The landlord kept saying that, transition or no transition, we would have to pay rent on the first or get out. My father said firmly but very calmly, “Mr. Pavlov, there will be no more rent. Today is the end of our landlord-tenant relationship. We are now fellow homeowners.”

“We’ll see what the police have to say about that when they get here,” said the landlord loudly. “This is my property and what I say, goes!” When the police came, they said they couldn’t do anything as long as no one was hurting anyone, and they had been instructed to hold off from any action in situations like this until the situation had been clarified. One of the officers put it like this: “Mr. Pavlov, I’m sure you have a deed to the property that was binding and valid until today. But that declaration read over official media today stated that it is now illegal for you to own more than the home that you live in. That these people, your former tenants, are now the legal owners of their residences. On the surface of it, this doesn’t make sense, but we’ve never had a situation like this before.

There’s been no revolution or violence. The government is intact, and no one is bothering them. But this declaration says the rules we live by have suddenly changed by… but popular consensus it would seem. Early this morning there was some confusion. Some people were acting based on this declaration, and some weren’t. But as the day goes on, the great majority of people are playing by these new rules, without any laws being changed. So, what are we supposed to do, arrest nine out of ten people in Russia? We’ve got to wait for the government to decide what they will do. Until then, our job is to keep the peace. So, let’s do that, OK?”

Mr. Pavlov wasn’t finished; he said: “And so everything I’ve worked for comes to nothing? How am I supposed to retire and live with no pension since I owned my own small business, and no income from my one rental property?!”

Mrs. Ilyich, our neighbor the right side, firmly but patiently explained, apparently not for the first time: “Mr. Pavlov, as we’ve all explained to you, you don’t have to worry. Money is no more, for anyone. You don’t need money anymore for anything. Your home is yours; you have no mortgage to pay. Nobody needs money for anything. Everything is free now. You don’t need anything from us. We don’t owe you anything; you don’t owe us anything. And you don’t have to be responsible if our toilet overflows or our roof leaks.”

“Yes, sure, everything is free. No one needs money anymore. And I’m the Czar of all of Russia. That’s a load of horse manure! It’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard! This is just another Bolshevik push to take everything from those who earned it and give it to those who didn’t,” replied Mr. Pavlov and spat on the ground.

“Go home and relax, Alexei. Wait and see. This transition is very different from Bolsheviks or anything we’ve seen before. I believe the declaration! Look at the countries that transitioned before us! I think you’ll be fine and so will we. And I kind of resent your insinuation that we former tenants haven’t worked as hard as you or that we’re somehow less deserving. That is insulting and you know better. But let’s leave that in the past. The Cure teaches us to make a fresh start and work together and avoid holding grudges. So no hard feelings. I hope we can be friends.,” my father said.

“Have you read The Cure?” This was my mother.

“I don’t want to read Bolshevik propaganda,” said Mr. Pavlov emphatically.

“There haven’t been any Bolsheviks in Russia since 1990. Why don’t you read the short version? I think you’ll be surprised. I think it’ll put your mind at ease, and if you don’t like it, you can just delete it.”

“Hell, I might as well… but I’ll tell you right now it’s a waste of time.”

Mrs. Ilyich had one more parting word for Mr. Pavlov before everyone went home: “I understand why you’re upset and worried. I want you to know that if you ever have difficulties or hard times, we will all be there to support you. I think I speak for all of us. We’re not your enemies. Were your friends.”

There was a general round of agreement and nodding of heads. Mr. Pavlov shook his head a little and walked away quietly, and I’m pretty sure I saw a few tears in his eyes.

That night we had friends over and had what felt like a feast. It was the first time in a while that nobody felt a little hungry when dinner was over. My parents considered themselves Catholic but hadn’t been to church or prayed or said a rosary in a long time, but tonight they said grace and offered up a prayer of thanks. After that we went to Mass regularly. My parents’ faith got ground down before, but it came back after transition.

It was a really good day. Maybe my best day.

Yekaterina: Wow, Ilyana, that really touched my heart. I was only two years old when transition happened, so I don’t really remember it. Thank you for that vivid account.

Ilyana: Believe it or not, it was really good to talk about it. Healing. I haven’t thought back to it much in a while. Thank you, Yekaterina, for taking me back there…

Yekaterina: Can you share some now about how your life has been since transition. And any observations or comments.

Ilyana: Sure.

In the days after transition, the news was full of coverage of government representatives talking about transition, reassuring everyone that there would be no serious disruptions if everyone just kept a level head and was patient while they worked out how to operate in this new situation. Advisers were invited in from transitioned countries.

There had been rumors for a decade or more that though he made as many appearances as ever, President Putin looked exactly as he had fifteen or twenty years ago, so people were saying that maybe he had died and the other oligarchs were using AI and animatronics to keep him alive, so to speak, as a kind of virtual figurehead to take heat for any bad public or international reactions to some of their more unpopular actions and policies. In any case, on the day after transition, Putin was nowhere to be found; nor were the other known oligarchs and a number of elected officials. Emergency elections were called for.

A few days later the news carried a lot of feature stories about the oligarchs. Fearing that they would be victims of a purge, they had attempted to flee to take refuge outside of Russia. Billionaires all of them, they suddenly found themselves with no access to their wealth, since all financial institutions and systems were shut down. They had to make do with whatever assets and cash they had on hand. A lot of these, they discovered, had been plundered by members of their staff and inner circle of employees and lieutenants.

They ended up forming an armed caravan to drive across the border to friendly Belarus, but when they got there, they were turned away because their wealth and power had evaporated literally overnight and they had become “too hot to handle” in the international climate. They got the same response from every country’s embassy whom they petitioned for entry.

Both the government and many voices from among the transitioneries called upon the deposed oligarchs to come out of hiding and go home, promising them that no one would harm them.

The paparazzi were quick to find them and put them on display. They finally came out of the building where they were hiding with their hands up and terrified, defeated, dejected expressions on their faces… into a crowd of citizens and some police who shook their hands, hugged them, and offered them food and drink. Putin was among them, but looking a lot older and more frail than his public appearances. So we learned that no, he wasn’t dead, but yes, they had been using AI and animatronics to make him seem unaging and virile. The closeups of their expressions showed bewilderment and incomprehension. At one point a man pushed his way through the crowd toward the group of dethroned oligarchs and started swinging a metal pipe, cursing and saying the time had come for them to taste some of their own medicine. Police firmly but quietly restrained him, disarmed him, and led him away, matter-of-factly with none of the brutality for which they were famous. A couple of people, including one of the former oligarchs, had been hit by the pipe in the scuffle; people were attending to them devotedly. The oligarchs’ expressions were dumbfounded.

Through this major undoing and changing of so much of the structure of society, life surprisingly continued in most ways almost as though nothing had happened. Classes went on like normal. My mother and father went to work but there was a big difference there. Both of my parents were working just one job each, so they were home a lot more. We started doing more things together as a family. My parents weren’t tired all the time. They had energy and talked excitedly about their jobs. Like I think I said before, it was like life had been a long night and now the sun was rising. It took weeks or months, but it was rising.

There were some, I guess you could call them growing pains in the beginning. As a child, I wasn’t aware of all of them, but I remember for the first year or two there were some strange situations.

After elections were held to replace the many elected representatives who had quit or stopped showing up, as well as a new president to replace aging Putin, a government spokesperson addressed the nation every evening to report on progress in the great challenges of adapting the laws to the new socioeconomic reality, and writing a new constitution codifying the transitioned humanistic principles into it.

It took about nine months for the new Constitution to be ready. It quickly passed the government but it was then put to the people to vote on it. President Rostov put it like this: “This is a unique and unprecedented situation for us whom you have chosen to represent you, the Russian people. You have presented us with a dramatic fundamental change in the workings of our entire society. And you have done it from the ground up and presented it to us as a fait accompli, without our involvement. So, if this is your will, which it clearly is, then we must adapt to this new situation. It will take time. People involved in this transition as you call it, are working with us along with advisory teams from countries who have already transitioned. Be assured, however, that no foreign power is influencing or pressuring us, and Russia will remain Russia in every way. Those of us who had not done so before are now studying The Cure, since this is the seed from which this phenomenon has grown. We ask your patience as we pledge to give you ours.”

Needless to say, the new constitution was overwhelmingly approved by the people.

But along the way there were some awkward situations that had to be resolved with no legal or functional framework yet in place. Some of them involved fights that nearly led to brief closures of parts of the city.

There was also the really scary time when Putin tried to take power with a private army he had put together. The city was closed for what seemed like quite a while. School was closed, and everyone was advised to stay inside as much as possible. Some days there was gunfire and explosions, so close I thought we would all die any minute. An abandoned bank not far away was destroyed; we could see the smoke and fire. A couple of injured people banged on our door asking for help. My parents let them in and called an ambulance. There was a lot of blood and the smell of smoke.

Sometimes there were tanks and other army vehicles in the streets, and soldiers. There was also a kind of civil war between one part of the army and another. My parents always had the television on, listening to the news.

I still have nightmares sometimes about that time. It felt like the world was ending.

But on the other hand, there was a lot of excitement of the good kind.

At first it was a giddy feeling knowing that I could go into any store, pick out anything I wanted, scan the items out, and leave, just like that. There were some limits but not really upsetting ones. Once I went into an electronics store (actually, an electronics distribution center, but I still thought of it as a store) and tried to take five VR headsets which we could never have afforded before. The scanner stopped me and asked, smiling playfully, “How many of these are you planning to use at one time? And how?”

“Oh, one of these is for me, the others are for my mother, my father, my sister, and my best friend.”

“There’s a strict rule against hoarding and profiteering. You’re allowed one for yourself. Your friends and family members will have to come in to get theirs, or they can order them on NoviMir then you can download their QR codes to your phone or print them out and use them to pick up theirs here.”

NoviMir, the universal web forum that we still use today, was already up and running the day after transition, thanks to our famously talented hackers who had taken the OpenSource code and localized it well before transition and had it ready to go.

So I called home and explained to my parents. Ten minutes later I had the QR codes and walked out with all five headsets. The scanner said to me, “Don’t feel bad. Some people try to grab more than they need, which could leave none left for others. Sometimes they send children in with stories just like yours.”

“I think I understand.”

“Now I want you to understand how it works now, and you can explain it to your family and friends, or here, you can record me on your phone and play it for them.”

He waited while I hit “Record.”

“You, your mom, dad, sister, and best friend are now linked to the devices you just acquired. If they break, bring them into any distribution center and get them replaced. When upgrades are available, it’ll be posted on NoviMir and broadcast to your devices. Bring them in and we’ll upgrade them for you. You can only get a different one if you return the one you have. From now on, all products will be designed to be easily repaired and upgraded as technology advances.”

“It’ll take time for things to settle in and for us to get used to them. By the way, would you like a second battery pack? It’s allowed.”

“No, but thanks. My parents said we can only use them for an hour or two a day and only if we’re good.”

“Very wise, your parents! That saves me from having to give you the standard warning that excessive use of video games can cause mental, emotional, and physical health problems and social anxiety.”

“Yeah, I know.”

“Make sure you also play outside with friends.”

“Yes, yes I do. Thank you.” And I left the store, a little impatient with him because I’d heard similar lectures from both my parents and more than one teacher. But I was a bit of a tomboy, so they really didn’t need to. I’d never used VR before, because we couldn’t afford it. And a lot of my VR’ing turned out to be very active outdoor mixed reality games with real friends in virtual landscapes and a lot of running.

The novelty of everything being free wore off after a while. Soon it was just normal.

There’s so much that’s happened in my life since then. I’ll try to not go on too long.

As a civil engineer, my father was involved in planning and setting up the Moskva Metro Green System, the network of roads and paths for bicycle, scooter, foot, horse, and unpowered vehicles, with food courts, bathrooms, rest areas and parks that went on to become the pride of Moskva. Over dinner he would talk excitedly about how much more he could do, and how much faster, since transition, since funding was no longer an issue. “If we have the vision, the need, the will, the manpower, and the materials, we can just do it! Of course, we liaise with other parties who may need the same resources to make sure we’re all on the same page, which is easy on NoviMir.” He was also involved in the development of the distributed power grid and decommissioning of most of the dams and nuclear power plants, as well as all of the fossil fuel power plants in Moskva and in all of Russia. He said more than once that the years since transition were the happiest, most productive years of his life.

My mother still worked at the same department store, which transitioned to a distribution center for the same kinds of things that used to be sold there. The instead of trying to sell shoppers on things and sign them up for credit cards, she was tasked with answering customer questions, helping them find things, explaining the new ways of doing things, and also coordinating with other distribution centers to ensure a smooth supply chain, track inventory, and customize the software to learn use patterns and anticipate need. There were no managers or corporate head offices, no chain of command, and no pressure. There were bi-weekly meetings of all staff where they discussed necessary topics and made decisions, usually over a tasty meal. Like my father, she was much happier and more excited about her job than she’d ever been before transition. And she no longer had aching feet, since no one was telling her to wear high heals and not sit while working. She really enjoyed helping people and tweaking the layouts to be easier for customers and personnel to work with. She said it was like solving puzzles, which was one of her hobbies.

I finished school and graduated high school already accepted to university. School had become much more vibrant and exciting since transition. Before, they taught us things and I enjoyed learning, but that was about it. The purpose of school seemed to be to prepare us for filling whatever menial jobs were available after we graduated.

After transition, teachers started encouraging us to think about our talents, interests, and passions. They told us that if we pursued them to the fullest, we would live the most fulfilling lives while also making our best contribution to our communities. Then many teachers actively encouraged us, mentored us, gave us materials and resources to pursue them on our own, and even introduced us to people who could give us real life exposure and experience.

Katya wanted to be an aeronautical engineer and test pilot, so our science teacher introduced her to one of the pilots at a nearby test facility, where she got to watch a lot of the process. They even gave her some basic flight training and let her fly simulators of real experimental airplanes in development. Full-motion simulators!

For me, I was taken to meet members of some top folkloric music groups and the Moskva Philharmonic Orchestra and took lessons from one of the most amazing balalaika players I’d ever heard. I added violin and guitar to my list. This could never have happened before transition. Of course, this was on top of my regular studies, and I had to keep my attendance and grades up. Basically, if you had the interest and ability and passion, and were really serious, you could pursue and learn your passion.

I became quite a good soccer player too.

Then I went to university. My major was music, of course, and drama. But since there wasn’t the kind of pressure on me as there would have been before transition, you know, to get my degree and get out in the job market to start making money, I also took minors in mathematics, electrical engineering, energy systems design, and agricultural science.

During this time, I also learned a lot about the design and making of wooden musical instruments from a third-generation luthier whom I met at the campus commons. That led to an interest in carpentry, so I got some training in that too. So, my formal education took six years instead of the old norm of four. But it was worth it.

Yekaterina: So you’re an example of what’s been called the “new Renaissance woman (or man):” a person with multiple simultaneous fields of study and careers. This has become quite common in the post-transition world. Can you talk a little bit more about it? And how many of these fields actually became careers?

Ilyana: I think you’re right about a lot of people doing it. Most of my friends in my generation are doing it or already have. I know it wasn’t at all common before transition. Apparently, people would often change majors once or twice, but pursuing more than maybe a major and one minor was almost unheard of.

Actually, everything I studied and learned during those six years has become career. The thing is, music is my first love, but I’m not one of those people who obsesses about it to the exclusion of everything else. So, for example, I put my electrical engineering and energy systems expertise to use by joining my local electrical infrastructure syndicate. I enjoy jostling minds with others to come up with novel designs and solutions. I love both the collaboration and the competition, and I love to see something I’ve worked on become part of our power grid or even turn into a patent of a new design. And I enjoy training interested non-technical people in the maintenance and repair of their local parts of the grid and basic electrical tasks in the home. I enjoy seeing them get it and feeling empowered.

Likewise I’m an avid gardener and enjoy getting my hands in the earth, watching things grow, and of course eating fresh vegetables and seeing beautiful gardens, and of course the socializing. I hear people were really isolated before transition, even from neighbors or family. I’m glad it isn’t like they anymore.

Anyway, I think another reason a lot of us are New Renaissance is because most jobs don’t demand a lot of our time like they used to before transition. Back then, that self-devouring cycle was out of control, so most jobs had a lot of unnecessary pressure and demands because of the unquenchable drive for profits. One job could take up all of your time. I saw it with my mother and father and in my friends’ families too.

After transition, there were a few years when everyone worked long hours because it was needed in order to get the new system running. Also since the new goal was to make the best possible versions of everything and make sure everyone had what they needed and wanted, within reason, but without the old profit pressure, there was a lot of production to do but the pace was a lot more reasonable than before. Production teams set their own pace.

Once everyone had enough of whatever, they only needed to make enough to replace what broke, so after the first few years, one job or career took little of our time. That’s how it was already when I joined the workforce. So, it’s natural to have more than one job or career or niche.

I remember seeing my parents being slowly ground down in their jobs. That’s really changed since transition, since people can follow their interests and passions. Most of us have more than one interest, if we have the chance to explore and develop them.

I’m glad I was born when I was. I feel like I’m here for a huge breakthrough as big as the discovery of fire or electricity or agriculture. How many people can say that? Well, actually, about eight and a half billion of us, but you know what I mean. And I think my generation fully appreciates it in ways that Gen T and later generations can’t. They can’t compare before and after. They can only hear or read about it or watch a documentary.

Yekatrerina: Yes, I know what you mean, though speaking as a Gen T’er, I also feel glad to be born when I was. But the fact that we both feel that way says something good about the world we’ve inherited and helped create.

Before we wrap up, can you talk a little about your life now, like you would if we were sitting next to each other on a long flight to Moon City?

Ilyana: Yes, of course.

I met my husband Vlad in college, and our relationship just kept deepening as we ran into each other in more and more classes and workshops. It wasn’t just common interests either. There was what the Americans call chemistry, and we complement each other. One of us is always coming up with an idea, and the other always plays devil’s advocate and tries to poke holes in it. Not to be mean, but to explore the possibilities. And our musical relationship is a whole thing of its own.

Anyway, we got married the year before we both finally graduated. We moved into married student housing, then when we graduated, we found a home we loved available for claiming on NoviMir, filed our claim and moved in. Were still living there.

We have two children, one boy Alexei and one girl Tasha, a dog, and a cat.

We’re both active in community infrastructure and agriculture syndicates as well as community theater and the musicians’ syndicate. A couple of times a year, most years, we perform in the Philharmonic.

Both of our mothers and fathers are pretty old now, so we visit them a lot and help them out when they need it, though they’re very social and active, all four of them, and they have a great support network.

Yekaterina: Is there anything else you’d like to add?

Ilyana: Oh, I could go on for a lot longer, but I think we’ve covered what you wanted to get down. I guess what I’d say is why you’re doing these interviews, doing this project: I feel like humanity, and Russia, are in the best condition we’ve ever been in, ever. Let’s always remember that, appreciate it, and as the Americans like to say, don’t fuck it up.

Yekaterina: Thank you, Ilyana! This has been a rich and enjoyable interview. By the way, would you be open to doing a follow-up interview in maybe ten or twenty more years, in case someone wants to do a revisit?

Ilyana: Yes, yes I would. And thank you for interviewing me. This has been good. I think looking back and talking about this has given me a new perspective. I hope we can keep in touch. You’re always welcome to pay us a visit at our home.

Yekaterina: Yes, I’d like that too.